The ceramic art of Great Britain from pre-historic times down to the present day, Volume 1 (of 2) : $b being a history of the ancient and modern pottery and porcelain works of the kingdom and of their productions of every classJewitt, Llewellynn Frederick William
History
The ceramic art of Great Britain from pre-historic times down to the present day, Volume 1 (of 2) : $b being a history of the ancient and modern pottery and porcelain works of the kingdom and of their productions of every class
Jewitt, Llewellynn Frederick William
Pottery, British -- History
Another and equally pleasing variety of ornamentation, and one
peculiar, it may be said, to the Durobrivian potteries, is that whereon
the pattern consists of scrolls and flowers in white slip on the dark
bluish black ground. The effect of these simple patterns, which are
generally graceful and always elegantly formed, is remarkably pleasing.
Examples of these are given on Figs. 114 to 124, which will serve to
show the general style of this kind of decoration. Figs. 125 to 128 are
admirable examples of the indented form of vessel. Many other shapes
and varieties of Castor ware might be adduced, but the illustrations
I have given will be sufficient to give a clear insight into their
general characteristics.
[Illustration: Fig. 128.--Engine-turned Ware.]
[Illustration: Fig. 129.--Leicester Museum.
Fig. 130.
Fig. 131.
Fig. 132.
Fig. 133.
Fig. 134.
Fig. 135.
Fig. 136.
Fig. 137.
Roman Pottery.]
One of the most curious and interesting urns of this ware (Fig. 129)
was dug up in Leicester in 1869, and is preserved in the museum of that
town. It is of a fine rich deep colour, with the pattern in white slip,
and has borne an inscription, also in slip, the only letters of which
now remaining are M E I I VI. In the same museum, among other
varieties of Romano-British ware, are the beautiful vessels shown on
Figs. 132, 133, 134. There are also fragments of ware which seem to
point at pottery which I believe, at one period of Roman occupation,
existed in the neighbourhood of Leicester.
[Illustration: Fig. 138.--Potter’s Kiln, St. Paul’s Churchyard.]
Potters’ kilns of the Romano-British period have been found in other
places, but those at Castor are the most perfect, and in every way the
best. Indeed, the others may be said, more appropriately perhaps, to
be indications of kilns rather than the kilns themselves. A curious
record of the discovery of a kiln in London, at the north-west of St.
Paul’s Cathedral, in 1677, by John Conyers, a collector of antiquities,
is preserved in the British Museum,[12] and has been published by Mr.
Roach Smith,[13] the eminent archæologist, to whom the antiquarian
world is indebted for so much valuable information concerning Roman
antiquities. This very curious and valuable record is as follows, in
the handwriting of Conyers, and the accompanying engraving is carefully
reduced (see Fig. 138) from Conyers’ own drawing:--
“This kill was full of the coarser[14] sorts of potts or cullings,[15]
so that few were saved whole, viz., lamps, bottles, urnes, dishes.
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
The ceramic art of Great Britain from pre-historic times down to the present day, Volume 1 (of 2) : $b being a history of the ancient and modern pottery and porcelain works of the kingdom and of their productions of every class — John Shaqi
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